Chapter 8 - The Morning Sun over Astoria
At six o'clock the following morning, the rain stopped.
The sky above Alpine turned a pale, cold lilac, the sun rising behind the hemlock trees in long, thin shafts of yellow light that burned the grey mist off the lawn.
Claire stood on the blue flagstones under the stone porte-cochère.
She was wearing her black Fulton Street trousers, her frayed white dress shirt, and her cheap black oxfords. Over her shoulder sat her black canvas tote bag containing her paperback Erie Canal book, her foil pack of ibuprofen, her phone charger, and the silver-framed photograph of her mother.
Beside her stood Thomas, holding the rear door of a plain silver sedan—not the Maybach, but an eight-year-old Cadillac that her father used for quiet trips to the concrete yards in Newark.
Augustus stood six feet away, wearing his dark wool overcoat against the cold morning draft. He looked old in the pale sunlight, the deep lines around his eyes sharp and unforgiving, his white hair combed back flat against his narrow skull.
"You don't have to go back to Astoria, Charlie," Augustus said softly.
"My rent is paid through the end of the month, Dad," Claire said.
"I can buy the building," Augustus offered, his voice devoid of its usual threat, sounding almost tired. "I can give the landlord ten million dollars and turn it into a private residence for you. You can have the whole floor. You can have a garden on the roof."
Claire smiled—a tiny, genuine smile that didn't reach her swollen lower lip, but warmed her gray eyes for the first time in twenty-four hours.
"I like the four-story walk-up, Dad," she said. "The stairs keep my legs strong."
Augustus looked down at the flagstones. "Peter Wallace called five minutes ago. He signed the papers with Frank Rainer at eight o'clock this morning. Dominic is on a flight to Tampa. He won't come back."
"Good," Claire said.
"Peter wants to know if you're coming back to work on Tuesday," Augustus said. "He said he'll make you head captain of the floor. Eight hundred dollars a week plus tips."
Claire took a slow breath of the cold morning air, smelling the pine needles and the wet earth of the Alpine hills.
"Tell Peter I resign," she said. "I found a new job yesterday."
Augustus looked up, his brow furrowing. "Where?"
"A diner on 31st Street in Astoria," Claire said, pulling her canvas tote bag higher onto her shoulder. "They need a breakfast cook three days a week. Six to two. Eighteen dollars an hour."
Augustus went quiet for five long seconds.
He looked at her black trousers from Fulton Street. He looked at her dark blond hair tied back with three cheap plastic slides. He looked at the silver hoop earring hanging level from her left ear lobe—the earring that had clicked against the Siena marble floor sixteen hours ago.
"Eighteen dollars an hour isn't enough to live on in this city, Charlie," he said softly.
"It's twenty-six hundred dollars a month, Dad," Claire said, stepping toward the silver sedan. "My rent is nine hundred. My food is four hundred. That leaves thirteen hundred dollars for books, sardines, and subway cards."
She stopped beside the open door of the Cadillac, turned, and looked at her father one last time.
"I don't need your millions, Dad," she said softly. "I only needed you to answer the phone once."
Augustus Carver stood under the cold stone canopy of his eighteen-room fortress, his hands buried deep in the pockets of his dark wool overcoat, watching his daughter step into the back seat of the silver sedan.
"Charlie," he called out just as Thomas was about to shut the door.
Claire looked out through the open window. "Yes?"
Augustus swallowed hard, his throat moving against his white collar.
"I'll be sitting in the green van at the end of 31st Street every Tuesday morning," he said.
Claire looked at her father—at the white hair, the sharp cheekbones, the gray eyes that mirrored her own—and gave him a small, quiet nod.
"Bring your own coffee, Dad," she said softly. "The diner's coffee is terrible."
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The car door shut with a heavy, clean click.
The silver Cadillac pulled away down the three-quarter-mile driveway, winding through the hemlock trees into the bright yellow morning sun, carrying Charlotte Carver back to the city where she owned nothing except her own name.
